48.
AURORA VALEN?A
Living with Dante was not romantic.
It was noisy.
He occupied space.
Large shoes near the door.
Documents on the table.
Shirts in the bedroom.
Cologne inside the bathroom.
Calls from the office.
A black mug he insisted on leaving in the sink.
“You have employees,” I complained.
“Not in this house.”
“Then wash it.”
“I will.”
“When?”
“Now.”
He washed it.
That was new.
He also snored.
Quietly.
Enough.
“You didn’t snore before,” I said on the third night.
“I grew older.”
“A great deal.”
“Nineteen years before you.”
Corrected.
Had I remembered to alter the sentence in the manuscript of life?
No.
Now the age difference was correct.
“When I was born, you were nineteen,” I said.
“Thank you for repeating it.”
“It is strange.”
“For me too.”
“You were almost an adult.”
“I was an arrogant teenager.”
“Now you’re an arrogant adult.”
“In recovery.”
The children loved living together.
During the first few days.
Then they discovered that a father living at home also said no.
“Daddy mean,” Tomás declared when Dante prevented a second sweet.
“Yesterday he was good,” Elisa reminded him.
“Today mean.”
“Tomorrow it passes,” Cecília said.
Dante accepted it.
“I hope so.”
Shared discipline required adjustments.
He preferred stricter schedules.
I worked with flexibility.
He organized toys into boxes.
The children mixed everything.
He made lists.
I trusted my memory.
“Memory fails,” he said.
“So does your list.”
“How?”
“You forgot to write ‘bring cloth,’ and Cecília cried.”
Dante corrected it.
“Now it is there.”
“Children do not fit inside a list.”
“It helps.”
“A little.”
We divided it.
Calendar on the wall.
Visual routine.
But room for chaos.
The psychologist approved.
The museum entered the final stage of restoration.
I spent more hours in Petrópolis and Rio.
Dante handled mornings.
Took them to school.
Collected them.
Prepared snacks.
He had learned to make eggs.
Still bad.
The children ate them.
“Daddy makes dead eggs,” Tomás said.
The first time I traveled for two days without them was to supervise the return of a piece from Portugal.
Dante stayed.
Not Mrs. Lurdes.
Not Marta.
Their father.
I prepared lists.
He tore one copy.
“What are you doing?”
“I have it on my telephone.”
“Paper is better.”
“And I know the routine.”
“The pen…”
“Kitchen and backpack.”
“The cardiologist…”
“Number saved.”
“School…”
“Marta knows.”
“Cecília…”
“Calendar with two moons.”
He pointed.
Two nights.
“And if…”
Dante held my shoulders.
“You can go.”
“Do not order me.”
“I’m asking.”
“Will they be all right?”
“I cannot guarantee no one spills juice, has a tantrum, or wakes at night. But they will be safe.”
I breathed.
“And you?”
“Probably exhausted.”
“I can cancel.”
“No.”
“This is important.”
“Then go.”
The children managed better than I did.
During the first call, Elisa showed me a drawing.
Tomás forgot to speak to me because he was playing.
Cecília asked how many moons.
“Two. This is the first.”
“Then one.”
“Yes.”
“Daddy stays.”
“He does.”
“Then okay.”
She ended the call.
I cried.
Dante sent a message:
She is fine. You are allowed to be fine too.
I returned two days later.
The children ran toward me.
Dante remained behind them.
He did not need to claim an embrace.
I went to him.
Kissed him.
“Did you survive?”
“Bathing on alternate days.”
“Theirs?”
“Mine.”
I laughed.
“Thank you.”
“Was the work good?”
“Very.”
“Then it was worth it.”
The recovered piece would become the center of the first exhibition.
A painting missing for fifteen years.
During conservation, we found an old label on the back bearing my mother’s signature.
She had documented it.
That helped rebuild the history.
The museum’s opening was scheduled for the fifth anniversary of my parents’ deaths.
I hesitated.
“It can be another date,” Dante said.
“I want to transform it.”
“Then we do.”
The reopening ceremony would be larger than the foundation launch.
But under my rules.
No excessive flowers.
No luxury.
No press near the children.
No altar.
During the preparation, I began thinking about marriage.
Not from pressure.
Dante never mentioned it.
The ring remained in the safe.
I knew.
Sometimes, I imagined it.
A ceremony at the museum?
No.
It would mix too much together.
In the backyard?
Perhaps.
Inside the church?
My body reacted.
Panic.
But also a desire to reclaim it.
I did not want that place to belong forever to the worst day of my life.
I went alone.
On a Tuesday.
The church was empty.
There was a different priest.
I entered.
The aisle appeared smaller.
One hundred and forty-three guests were not there.
No photographers.
No Dante.
Only pews.
Light.
The altar.
I walked.
Every step brought back a memory.
Papers.
A voice.
“Is it mine?”
“There is no us anymore.”
I cried.
But continued.
I stopped in front of the altar.
The table had changed.
A new cloth.
Simple flowers.
It was not the same place.
It was.
And it was not.
Like me.
I sat in the front pew.
I remained for one hour.
When I left, I called Dante.
“Where are you?”
“Office.”
“The children?”
“At school.”
“Can you meet me?”
“Where?”
I told him.
Silence.
“I’m coming.”
“You don’t need to hurry.”
“I won’t.”
He arrived twenty minutes later.
He entered.
Stopped when he saw me in the aisle.
His expression changed.
Pain.
Fear.
“Why did you come?”
“I wanted to enter alone first.”
“Are you all right?”
“I don’t know.”
Dante approached.
“May I?”
I held out my hand.
We walked together.
Not to the altar.
Halfway.
I stopped.
“This is where I realized no one was looking at me.”
“I remember.”
“Do you remember everything?”
“Every second.”
“I wanted to forget.”
“So did I.”
“But I do not anymore.”
Dante looked at me.
“What do you want?”
“Another memory.”
He became still.
“Not a proposal today,” I warned.
“All right.”
“And not necessarily a wedding here.”
“All right.”
“I only want to walk without feeling I am returning to die.”
His hand tightened.
“We can come again.”
“Yes.”
“With the children?”
I thought.
“One day.”
“All right.”
We walked farther.
To the altar.
Dante stopped one step behind me.
“Why?”
“I will not stand before you here without being invited.”
The gentleness struck me.
I held out my hand.
He came.
We stood side by side.
Not facing each other.
“You removed the ring here,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Do you still have it?”
Dante appeared surprised.
“I do.”
“Where?”
“In the same safe as the new ring.”
“You kept it?”
“An employee collected it. I never discarded it.”
Preserved ruins.
“I want to see it one day.”
“I’ll show you.”
We left.
At the door, I found a poster for a community celebration.
Nothing important.
Life continued in that place.
“I want to marry you,” I said.
Dante stopped.
“What?”
“Not today.”
“Aurora.”
“Listen.”
He closed his mouth.
“I want to. But I do not want a surprise proposal. I do not want it in public. I do not want you using the children to pressure me.”
“Never.”
“I want to choose the way it happens.”
“Yes.”
“And perhaps I want it here.”
His eyes filled.
“Are you certain?”
“Not completely.”
“All right.”
“But I want to transform the place.”
“We can.”
“A small ceremony.”
“Yes.”
“The children.”
“Of course.”
“Mrs. Lurdes, Miguel, Marta, people close to us.”
“Yes.”
“Not one hundred and forty-three.”
“How many?”
“Thirty.”
“Forty.”
“Dante.”
“Thirty.”
I smiled.
“You still need to ask.”
“When?”
“Not now.”
“Cruel.”
“I want to be ready to hear it.”
“And when will you be?”
“You’ll know.”
“How?”
“I’ll tell you.”
He laughed through tears.
“That removes the surprise.”
“Exactly.”
I kissed his face.
“Wait.”
“I know.”
“You may say it.”
“I’ll wait.”
That night, I told the children we might marry one day.
Chaos began.
Elisa chose a dress.
Tomás wanted to carry the rings on a dinosaur.
Cecília asked whether Daddy would leave at the altar.
The world stopped.
I knelt.
“No.”
She looked at Dante.
“You stay?”
He came toward us.
“I stay if your mother chooses to marry me. And even afterward, I remain your father.”
“You don’t take ring off?”
My chest tightened.
She had heard something.
Perhaps a conversation.
Perhaps Elisa.
“I will not remove your mother’s ring to hurt or abandon her,” Dante answered.
“Promise?”
He looked at me.
“I promise that if I one day wear a ring from your mother, I will not remove it to hurt or abandon her.”
Concrete.
Cecília accepted.
“I carry moon.”
“You can,” I said.
The children continued planning.
Dante did not propose that week.
Or the following one.
The museum reopened.
The ceremony was emotional.
My parents appeared in photographs.
Otávio only in the documentary memorial.
Ant?nio Ferraz too.
Without concealment.
The children cut the ribbon with me.
Dante stood beside us, not at the center.
Later, inside the provenance room, Elisa asked:
“Daddy’s grandpa was bad?”
Dante crouched.
“He did bad things.”
“Like you?”
“Different things.”
“Did he say sorry?”
“He died before I knew everything.”
“Then couldn’t.”
“No.”
“You can.”
Dante looked at me.
“I try.”
Tomás pointed at a painting.
“This was stolen?”
“It was,” I explained.
“Now came back.”
“Yes.”
Cecília held our hands.
“Like Daddy.”
The sentence pierced me.
Dante had returned.
Not like a recovered object.
Like a man choosing.
That night, after the reopening, I found him in the backyard.
“I’m ready,” I said.
He went still.
“For what?”
“You know.”
“I need to hear it.”
“For the proposal.”
Dante breathed.
“Now?”
“You don’t need to…”
He knelt.
“Dante!”
“I waited months.”
“The ring?”
He removed it from his pocket.
“You carry it?”
“For two weeks.”
I laughed.
Cried.
The children appeared at the window.
Of course.
“Daddy’s on floor!” Tomás shouted.
Elisa opened the door.
“Proposal!”
Cecília came behind them.
“Moon.”
Dante looked at me.
“I had not planned an audience.”
“I know.”
“May I continue?”
I nodded.
He held my hand.
“Aurora Valen?a, I do not want to erase the altar, the years, or the pain.”
The children reached us.
Elisa attempted to look at the ring.
Tomás sat on the floor.
Cecília held my dress.
“I want to build everything that comes afterward with you. I want to continue choosing, listening, and staying. I want to be your husband without ceasing to be the man who still needs to deserve you every day.”
Tears fell.
“That is long,” Elisa commented.
“Very,” Tomás agreed.
Dante almost laughed.
“Will you marry me?”
I looked at him.
At our children.
At the two houses transformed into one.
At the studio.
At the museum illuminated in my imagination.
“Yes.”
The children screamed.
Dante placed the ring on my finger.
Not the old one.
A new one.
Simple.
Pink?
No.
Platinum with a discreet stone.
“Pretty,” Cecília said.
“Small,” Elisa complained.
“It belongs to your mother,” Dante answered.
“I want big.”
“When you’re an adult, you choose.”
Tomás picked up a leaf.
“I carry ring.”
“Not yet,” I said.
Dante stood.
He kissed me.
The children embraced us simultaneously.
That time, he did not hesitate.
The house was full.
The proposal was neither private nor perfect.
But it was ours.
And the man kneeling before me did not resemble the one who had left a ring on the altar.
Not because the past had vanished.
Because every day since his return, he had chosen the opposite.